We’ve all heard the saying: winners never quit, and quitters never win. The problem with that advice is that it’s not true. Not only do quitters win, sometimes it’s necessary to quit to win. The trick is knowing what to quit and when. Here’s where we can find some great advice in an unlikely place – a country music song from 1978.

I don’t understand why telling the truth is such a hard concept for some people. I “get” that people want to save face, help someone else save face, or just not hurt someone else’s feelings, and might choose to not fully disclose something. There are limits, however, and if we’re not cognizant of them we risk making a difficult situation even worse and potentially destroying a relationship.

I have a pretty good sense of humor and I like a good laugh. (This month’s blog title is actually a line from one of my favorite movies – “The Court Jester” with Danny Kaye. Very silly movie.) I have a big laugh – no sweet little giggles here - it’s not at all unusual to hear my great big belly laugh emanating from my office on any given day.

Many years ago, a gentleman applied for a lead sales/consulting position in the agency in which I worked. Because I was familiar with this individual, my manager asked me for my thoughts on his suitability for the role. I commented that his technical skills were quite good but I was concerned about his interpersonal skills. When asked for more detail, the only way I could articulate my comment was to say he’s the type that would be nice to you, but rude to the waiter. He didn’t get the job.

Have you ever had an entire conversation with someone and you suspect they didn’t really hear a word you said? Oh, they nodded in all the right places and you maybe even got an affirmative grunt or two, but you know they weren’t really listening. Or maybe you were the grunter because your mind was someplace else.

Last week was just not my week. I was really sick, my heat pump at home went out, my office looks like a tornado went through it, I was not at the top of my game and I just felt like I was letting everyone down. It sucked in ways I cannot even explain. Add to that, all around me are the New Year’s Resolutions lists. Whether it’s a personal resolution list or a career-focused list, so many of those lists focus on ‘fixing’ what’s ‘wrong’ with us. You know the ones; they start with New Year! New You! and implore you to start the newest diet, exercise every day, change the way you work, blah blah blah and essentially remind you of just how ‘broken’ you are. I didn’t need the reminder.

So I was shopping at my local Costco a few weeks ago and happened to bump into one of my first supervisors from my days with Capital BlueCross. Roseanne was a task master for sure. Although at the time I never doubted that she cared, I’m certain I didn’t fully appreciate the wisdom in her words. These 30(!) or so years later, I see her at Costco and practically burst telling her how much I learned from her and that I still go back to those lessons and still quote her to this very day. We must have been quite a site hugging and crying in the snack food aisle.

Last month we talked about resumes so it seems fitting to talk about the next step: interviews. I’ve had occasion to do a fairly substantial number of interviews lately and it’s been…..interesting. As I look back over interviews I’ve done over the years, I’d like to give you my top five do’s and don’ts for folks going on interviews.

I've been reading a lot of resumes lately; some are really good, others are ok, and still others are…well…they could use a little re-tooling. If you've been following my blog for a while, you know I like to cook and I like to eat (not necessarily in that order). I also really like sharing recipes. In that spirit, I'd like to share my recipe for a well-written resume; I use this for my own resume as well as those I compose for others.

You'd have to be living under a rock not to have heard about #metoo and #timesup and the revelations of sexual harassment and misconduct being leveled at many public figures. Something that I've found troubling is some of the stories where sexual harassment and workplace romance are discussed together as though one has some sort of connection to the other. So before we talk about sexual harassment, let's be clear that it's not the same as a workplace romance and why.

If you don't know or you're not sure what ERISA is or why it's important you're not alone. ERISA is a massive piece of legislation. Think of it as kind of the Godfather of employee benefit plan regulation.